Review: Ek Chalis Ki Last Local

Noir collides with absurdity in a delicious â if overlong â black comedy.

MAY 20, 2007 – PAY ATTENTION to the credits sequence that opens (and sets the tone for) Ek Chalis Ki Last Local. Pay attention to the kings and queens and jacks on the faces of playing cards, to the guns, to the long legs perched on killer stiletto heels, to the rows of lamps on an empty street, to the silhouettes by a train compartment, to the great wads of cash, and most of all, pay attention to the way these images have been lit â as if the entire shooting was conducted in a low-voltage situation, resulting in your having to practically squint to see whatâs up there on the screen. One reason for all this near-darkness is, of course, the late-hour setting of the film, which gets going when Nilesh (Abhay Deol, who continues his dream run after Socha Na Tha, Ahista Ahista and Honeymoon Travels Pvt. Ltd.) misses the transport of the title and has to, therefore, kill time till the first train of the morning. But thereâs another reason: the twilight zone of the timeframe appears to allude as much to the stretch between darkness and sunrise as the space between the real and the imagined. (Itâs very likely that Martin Scorseseâs surreal After Hours served as a jump-off point.) Ek Chalis is so out there in terms of what occurs â the highpoint of the inventively sustained absurdity may be a bit where Nilesh is held captive by a mobster and winds up counting the birthmarks on the latterâs back â you half expect our hero to wake up at the end of the film and realise it was all a dream.

I became intrigued by Ek Chalis because of a line in the promos: a voiceover in the middle of the beautiful Laree Chhoote number (by Xulfi, lead guitarist of the Pakistani rock band Call) that goes, âLast local kya chhooti, saala kismat patri par aa gayi.â? No one talks like that in real life, but then the stylised talk of people in the noir films isnât from real life either â and this line feels very much like what a desi John Garfield would have spat out in something titled Daakiya Ghanti Hamesha Do Baar Bajaata Hai. The noir influences on Ek Chalis are evident right from the time Nilesh is established as an unlucky patsy â he loses his jacket, misses his train, and when he sits down to wait for the next one, his hand settles on an icky wad of used chewing gum â and Neha Dhupia (as the enigmatic Madhu) gives off the unmistakable air of a world-weary femme fatale. These characters donât stay entirely true to type â thereâs a lot of boy-meets-girl cuteness throughout â but the endlessly quotable dialogue does. Walking on a desolate stretch of road, with Madhu by his side, Nilesh muses, âHalka sa nasha, bheegi si raat, khubsoorat saath… aur kya chahiye aadmi ko!â? Thereâs a beauty of an existential throwaway in the form of âDuniya ka har bachcha aur lafda aurat hi paida karti hai,â? but my favourite would be the sarcastic rejoinder by a customer in a bar whoâs asked by the bartender what he wants. Clearly irritated by the apparent irrelevance of the question, he shoots back, âEk VIP ki chhattees number ki chaddi de.â?

And these noir elements get filtered through the stylings of Quentin Tarantino, whoâs undoubtedly Dronacharya to (first-time) director Sanjay Khanduriâs Eklavya â and Khanduri is pretty unapologetic about the fact. He lets us on to this himself, with two explicit homages to Tarantinoâs work â one that takes off on Mr. Blonde cutting off the policemanâs ear in Reservoir Dogs, and another based on Marcellus getting sodomised in Pulp Fiction with a squeeze toy stuffed in his mouth. Like Tarantino, Khanduri appears fascinated with pop-culture patter â nods to Nana Patekar, Ram Balram, DDLJ, and an action sequence that channels Super Star Rajinikanth (which youâve got to see to believe) â spliced into a twisty narrative involving kidnapping, double-crosses, and lots and lots of killings. But as with its predecessors in spirit â the likes of Is Raat Ki Subah Nahin and Waisa Bhi Hota Hai Part 2 â what happens or why isnât as important as how. Itâs the staging that counts, the freakish eccentricity in the details. Itâs the over-the-hill singer in the seedy bar who comes off like Bindu on a bad makeup day, itâs the gambling room decorated with wall-high pictures of the gods Ayyappan and Venkateshwara, itâs the image of a man wiping an imaginary speck of dirt off the hood of his black Mercedes (at night!), itâs the hunt under the sofa for a gangsterâs glass eye… Ek Chalis goes on for far too long and makes ill-advised detours into sentiment, but itâs extremely well shot and acted and put together, and itâs seen through by a terrific funk-rock background score. If you manage to catch its wavelength, itâs a larky scream.

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Thank you, brother Baddy!
I had a wonderful time catching Ek Chalis Ki Last Local. Surely among the smarter attempts to transport Tarantinoish stylisation and Coen Brothers-ish absurdity into a Mumbaiyya setting.
I liked the Shootout at Lokhandwala trailer too inspite of initially being put off by Oberoi’s obvious Company hangover and Sanjay Gupta’s association with the film.
Another good year for Hindi cinema, huh?

J.A.P – I hate to tell you, then, that the slate of releases this summer looks extremely promising – beginning with Cheeni Kum and Shootout at Lokhandwala this Friday. BTW, does being “guide” entail any monetary benefits? Just asking…

I am an avid movie buff and have been writing reviews for my friend circles since 98, its only very recently that i managed to blog the same. Around the same time, a friend recommended your website, and i must tell you I only wish I could write with your flourish, its amazing ! You already would know this thanks to your dedicated fan following ! Can I request you do a critique on my website and let me know areas of improvement ?? Just hoping …..

I got to watch this flick finally, and boy, was I impressed! I think it’s the first true blue tribute to the QT brand of filmaking. Sanjay Khanduri clearly emerges one up on his namesake Gupta who made that Reservoir Dogs rip-off. Even though we now know that QT likes Kaante, the fact remains that it was a rip-off not an inspiration. In Khanduri’s case it is clearly inspiration.

The only thing I hated about Ek Chalis was that ‘bimar boorhi maa’ justification for prostitution…too much of a cliche.

So do you provide advice to aspiring film critics….why don’t you read my blog and give me some advice? ;-)….just kidding

Aditya, That cliche is what ai meant by “ill-advised detours into sentiment”, but it didn’t bother me all that much (in terms of the overall movie), so I didn’t dwell on it. And okay, I’ll take a look at your blog too 🙂

Hi B Rangan! This is Sanjay Khanduri. Writer and Director of Ek chalis Ki Last Local. Wud like u to thank u for judging the film for what it was correctly. (I hope this reaches B Rangan. Else if it reaches to anyone who liked Ek Chalis a bit… then plz frwd it to him .. as I dnt knw how to. Thanks Love to All. I am indebted to u all for ur understanding and appriciation for my film.
S. Khanduri.)

Saw this last night, and perhaps my expectations were too high, but I was quite disappointed. The concept was interesting enough but the films was too flat, and too long and uneven, to sustain interest consistently. But Abhay Deol was good towatch yet again…

I saw the movie before I read the review. Couldn’t have put it myself better. I think the average Indian movie-goer (will represented by Taran-Adarsh kind) will give a thumbs-down to this kind of movie-making. But it was an interesting film, having usual pitfalls of Indian cinema. Irritated by the length…

i loved the film..was so eccentric. unpredictible plot (barring the end).. the scenes which had me going OH! were where shes a whore or where the gangster wants him not her and the ghatkopar karate classes!!

i thought the dialogues were very well written… im from bombay..so dont know if that helps me relate better to the lingo!

br – great review…great writing..and not just this review, this entire blog. i thank you for helping me understand cinema better.